Hendy Scores Three as Eight-Try Saints Rout Pretoria Bulls

George Hendy scored a hat-trick as Northampton made it a perfect ten points from their first two European games with an eight-try hammering of the Bulls.

Sleightholme scored two tries and Pollock secured the fourth try inside an hour as a commanding Saints team ran riot in the second half.

The Bulls were still in the game with the score fourteen-five at the interval but a sin-binning to forward Alulutho Tshakweni in the 53rd minute for a needless trip proved very costly and they did not score a point in the second half.

International Fin Smith added 10 points with the boot as Saints moved to the summit of their pool on superior points difference from defending champions Bordeaux-Bègles with the two teams on 10 points.

The nature of this victory, following a 35-27 victory on the road at Pau last week, means last year's losing finalists Northampton could not have hoped for a better start as they look to improve on that in this campaign.

Bulls fly-half Wolhuter missed an early shot at goal before Saints opened the scoring when Henry Pollock broke before feeding Sleightholme who demonstrated his speed to race clear to the line.

But an mistake from Sleightholme let the Bulls back in as the ball slipped from his grasp in the tackle, allowing Pretoria winger Jacobs to kick on and show blistering pace of his own to score after 22 minutes.

Ten minutes later, Saints had their second try as fast passing from Alex Mitchell at the base of a ruck and then Fin Smith put Hendy over to make it fourteen to five at the break.

Saints were dominant in both ball and field position and were being given a helping hand from Bulls fly-half Wolhuter who twice missed touch with clearing penalties to reinvite pressure onto the away side.

That told after 48 minutes when Smith was again the creator, darting inside to wrong-foot the advancing defence before delivering a perfectly weighted grubber kick over the line for George Hendy to collect his second and Northampton's third score.

Bulls prop Alulutho Tshakweni was then sin-binned for a tripping offense on Emmanuel Iyogun. The prop was adamant he had been reacting to a trip momentarily before by Iyogun but the incident from the Northampton substitute was ruled accidental when looked at by the match officials.

Northampton capitalized of having the numerical advantage to clinch the try bonus point through Henry Pollock before Alex Coles and Ollie Sleightholme scored as the home team notched three scores in five frantic minutes.

George Hendy completed his triple with 12 minutes remaining and Josh Kemeny walked over for the eighth and final try of an excellent day for Saints in the final minute.

Rematch of Last Year's Final Next for Saints

The top two teams in the pool will face off in a rerun of the previous season's final when the tournament resumes in January as Saints travel to Bordeaux-Bègles. The Saints then round off the pool stage with a home game against Scarlets on 18 January.

The Bulls, who have one point from their opening two games, host Bristol in their next outing before an away trip face Pau.

Line-ups

Northampton: Furbank; Sleightholme, Hutchinson, Dingwall, Hendy; F Smith, Mitchell; Fischetti, Wright, Davison, Coles, Van der Mescht, Kemeny, Pearson, Pollock

Replacements: R Smith, Iyogun, Kundiona, Munga, Prowse, Graham, James, Thame

Bulls: Williams; Petersen, Gans, Vorster, Jacobs; Wolhuter, Burger; Tshakweni, Van der Merwe, Smith, Wiese, Van Heerden, Coetzee, Ludwig, Louw

Replacements: Else, Sithole, Mchunu, Gumede, Carr, Papier, Johannes, Van Niekerk

Yellow card: Tshakweni (53)

Match Officials

Referee: Hollie Davidson (Sco)

Assistant referees: Rob McDowell (Sco) and Dave Sutherland (Sco)

TMO: Mike Adamson (Sco)